Families need time, not money

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If you'd been listening to the Howard Government in recent years, you might have concluded it had an interest in the "early years" and the development of children.

The Prime Minister has suggested these issues were bringing even the best barbecue to a halt. Dr Fiona Stanley has served an effective term as Australian of the Year, advocating for children and promoting the benefits of strong early-childhood policy.

The budget, however, demonstrates just how little the Howard Government understands about the issues facing families and children. Trying to bribe thousands of families through a few extra dollars in our pockets does little to help us meet the challenges we face.

The budget offers a quasi-maternity leave payment, which reads like an incentive payment for procreation, effectively buying babies to deal with the declining birth rate. It is a financial benefit that supports the first five months of a child's life, with little regard for the next five years.

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The Government may argue its tax breaks and changes to the family benefit scheme will support family finances. But these amounts are insignificant in helping parents to spend more time with their children.

Rather than introducing innovative ways to support parents in staying at home with their children for as long as possible, we're left with inadequate child-care alternatives and a feeling that we can never earn enough to provide for our children. While progressive European countries are legislating shorter working weeks, the Howard Government is stuck on fuelling the economy by turning parents into workers, substituting quality time with their children for more material wealth.

Our Government and politicians are failing to grasp the message of the "early years" advocates. The answer is not more child-care places. The best carers children can have in the years before school are their parents.

As parents, we want support to care for our children ourselves. We want policy that allows for flexible working arrangements. We want our relationships with our children not to be underestimated and undervalued by the institutions that govern us.

As a father doing his best to work part-time to spend as much time as possible with his two young sons, I can say that the recent promises from both political parties do not feel very "family friendly". Most parents, when asked, would prefer to spend more time with their children than to work longer and earn more. But there is little in the budget to support this innate desire.

This budget is the way to families' hip-pockets and financial fears, but it's not the way to their hopes and hearts.